NEW ULM, Minn. — A judge issued an arrest warrant Tuesday for the mother of a 13-year-old boy resisting chemotherapy after the pair missed a court hearing on his welfare.
Brown County District Judge John Rodenberg also ordered that Daniel Hauser be placed in protective custody so he can get proper medical treatment for Hodgkin’s lymphoma.
The cancer is considered highly curable with proper treatment, but Daniel quit chemo after a single treatment and with his parents opted instead for “alternative medicines,” citing religious beliefs. That led authorities to seek custody. Rodenberg last week ruled that Daniel’s parents, Colleen and Anthony Hauser, were medically neglecting their son.
The family was due in court Tuesday to tell the judge results of a chest X-ray and arrangements for an oncologist. But Daniel’s father was the only one who appeared. He told Rodenberg he last saw Colleen Hauser on Monday evening.
“She said she was going to leave,” Hauser testified. “She said, ‘That’s all you need to know.’ And that’s all I know.”
He said his wife left her cellphone at home.
In his ruling last week, Rodenberg wrote that he would not order chemotherapy if Daniel’s prognosis was poor. But if the outlook was good, it appeared chemotherapy and possibly radiation was in the boy’s best interest, he wrote.
Rodenberg wrote that state statutes require parents to provide necessary medical care for a child. The statutes say alternative and complementary health care methods aren’t enough.
He also wrote that Daniel, who cannot read, did not understand the risks and benefits of chemotherapy and didn’t believe he was ill.
Daniel testified that he believed the chemo would kill him and told the judge in private testimony unsealed later that he’d fight taking it.
The Hausers, who have eight children, are Roman Catholic. They believe in the “do no harm” philosophy of the Nemenhah Band, a Missouri-based religious group that believes in natural healing methods.
